The first sight I was treated to when I stepped out of my room into the yard was a young girl sifting the white sand that the ground was covered with through a sieve. She was meticulously covering every square inch, depositing into an old, beat-up washbowl whatever didn’t belong in the sand. In effect, it represented what in interior spaces cleaning was all about.
The girl made way for me so I could wash my face and clean my teeth, but as soon as I was done with it, she went on with her chore.
By the time I was packed, my breakfast was ready and now the only thing left for me to do was to wait for someone who would drive me to Essakane. I hoped Guele’s arrangement would be better than the fictional camel ride the day before. Tombouctou was fine, I had to hand it that, but I didn’t plan to stay on here. I was not sure my impression of the town would be the same if I was forced to stay on for two more days.
Well, my slight apprehension proved to be unfounded. Someone did appear, a guy who said he had been sent by Guele, and so I picked my backpack, bid adieu to my hosts and went out.
Except it wouldn’t go so easy. Just to begin with, the car – a white „Toyota“ pick-up truck - wouldn’t start. Based on all my experiences in Africa so far, I suddenly saw a reason for unease again. But no one seemed to break any sweat over it. In this part of the world, this was just an everyday thing. The guy coolly opened the hood and started dabbling with the engine, while I waited to see the results. If I said I saw immediate effects of his tinkering, it would most certainly be a stretch. As ever in such cases, this thing drew a handsome number of onlookers, this time only kids, from pre-school to teen age.
And then, as if on a cue, they all joined in. One would be almost tempted to say that they were all working in harmony, and they’d only been waiting for the sign to get in on the act. The youngest one hopped up on the bed of the vehicle, the guy who was to be my driver jumped on the driver’s seat, and the rest joined forces and started pushing from behind. At first to no avail. Then the guys from behind shifted position and went in front, so now they started pushing the car back. To give it a longer run, I suppose, for the momentum it needed to jump-start.
Once more their attempts amounted to nothing. Then they started over again. But on the third try the car suddenly jerked, belched a cloud of ugly, dark, stinking smoke out of its exhaust pipe, and started grumbling loudly. Time to go.
I loaded my stuff on, took a seat next to the driver and my final leg up north, the one to Essakane, finally began. Or so I thought. Because, just a few minutes later I realised that my would-be driver had an entirely different plan. He brought me to the town centre, on the Boulevard Askia Mohamed, that paved artery of Tombouctou, and to my astonishment, simply dropped me off there.
„Wait here,“ he said. „Someone will come for you.“
„But who?!“ I was less than pleased.
„Tell them you are with Guele,“ was all he said and then he disappeared. Forever.
Pissed off or not, there was nothing I could do about him. Whether it was planned like that, or the guy acted of his own accord, I will never know. The thing is, I was there, entirely on my own, and now I had to find a transport to Essakane. Only half believing that a reference to Guele would amount to anything, I looked around and realised that I was on some kind of a waiting spot. There were a number of local girls sitting on metal chairs. There were some local youngsters casting about for... well, I had no idea what they were up to. In any case, they too were there. I was not sure how hopeful or not it all looked.
And then, miraculously, someone did turn up. And even more miraculously, they did offer a transport to Essakane. The only drawback was that they were charging money for it. 5000 CFA francs. But I was pissed off and by now mean looking enough that when I said:
„I’m not paying anything, I paid to Guele yesterday,“ nobody complained.
Or was it really that Guele had planned it like this? If so, then he could have at least made me familiar with the details of the arrangement. And spare me this uncertainty. Either way, it was another one of those four-by-fours and a few of us, all guys, got in. However, just so the things are kept from being drab and dreary, this new driver performed another stunt and dropped us all off only a hundred metres further.
And disappeared.
It started emerging as a pattern, maybe? Were we going to go all the way to Essakane like this, in fits and starts, all in few-hundred-metre stages, leaping from vehicle to vehicle?
This time at least, there was another pick-up truck and a number of westerners around it. They all went to Essakane. Not that it made things practically easier, but at least lifted some load of uncertainty off the whole affair. If so many westerners were at the same spot, all with the same destination in mind, then maybe I was on the right place after all.
Another local guy was collecting money, those 5000 CFA already mentioned, and most of tourists paid. And a number of locals, too. But I pulled out my Guele pass again and, miraculously, they left me alone. A few moments later, we were told to climb up on the bed of the truck. Westerners first. So we loaded our luggage and clambered up. Then they added some stuff like a stack of blankets, two or three sacks of potatoes and a few more goods I couldn’t identify. I grabbed one of the blankets and padded the space between my back and the edge of the bed. Some people followed my example.
And finally, locals were given permission to go up, too. It was only then that, in a merry company of fourteen in total, some people sitting on the very tailgate, we started our ride to Essakane. For better or for worse, it seemed there would be no more changing of vehicles today.
